


Supernova

by apolloshalo



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: A lot - Freeform, Anakin Skywalker Has a Sister, Anakin Skywalker Needs a Hug, Angst, Gen, Human Disaster Anakin Skywalker, Hurt/Comfort, I promise, It Gets Better, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Sibling Love, TRUST me it does, This is so cliche, Twin Fic, anakin has a family, anakin skywalker falls to the dark side, anakin skywalker has a twin, anakin skywalker's twin sister, as is sith fashion, bc he has a sister, but hope isn't lost, but im gonna make it interesting, i think, luke and leia are waiting for anakin, so does valouryn, these two try to take down sidious, they save each other's ass, twin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24939418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apolloshalo/pseuds/apolloshalo
Summary: Valouryn Skywalker is... drumroll... Anakin's twin. so yep this is a twin au I have a problem with writing these.This is a fix-it, but be warned, it gets messy and goes pretty far into canon events before turning back. Val is either going to be Anakin's anchor or buoy in the dark side, and we'll see whether or not she can catch him when he falls, and if they're able to bring balance to the Force together twice as fast.
Relationships: Ahsoka Tano & Original Character(s), Ahsoka Tano & Original Female Character(s), Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Anakin Skywalker & Original Character(s), Anakin Skywalker & Original Female Character(s), Anakin Skywalker & Original Jedi Character(s), Mace Windu & Jedi Padawan Character(s), Mace Windu & Original Character(s), Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	Supernova

The familiar flow of the dark side travelled through Valouryn Skywalker’s veins like carts on a worn down street. She was the driver, and knew to stay on one side of the road. Her Master had taught her the dangers of Vaapad, and how it involved dancing with the dark side, but that you had to know your enemy to defeat your enemy- although it was never the same with the sparring droids, who didn’t have a dark side to leech off of. Valouryn had become a near expert of feeding off of her opponent’s motives.

These weren’t the best droids for form seven in general, either- there was no programming for it, so the droids could hardly ever predict when Valouryn would make her move, and where. The only real victory came from besting her Master, which had happened a total of one time, on a fluke and thanks to an interrupting comm-message. Despite the mere-satisfactory training, Valouryn was quite proficient in Vaapad. Even through a shorter time at the Jedi temple on Coruscant, she had learned more in ten years than the younglings, Padawans and everyone who had been devoted to the work for life, thanks again to her Master.

Well, almost everyone.

Anakin entered the yard, waving at his twin sister. Valouryn shut off her azure blade, hardly panting after the exercise. Anakin’s metal arm glinted in Coruscant’s artificial light. It was his memento from clashing with Count Dooku- Valouryn was practically unscathed, but Anakin _had_ fought him longer. Now, he had a souvenir to show for his recklessness.

Valouryn couldn’t scold him on recklessness. She would admit, she was many things, but a hypocrite wasn’t one of them. “How are you breaking in the steel?”

Anakin lounged on the bench next to the doors, while Valouryn stretched from the not-so-demanding workout. “It’s okay so far. Heavy, though.” Anakin flexed his cybernetic. “What are you doing out here?”

Valouryn shrugged, re-equipping her belt with her lightsaber hilt that was just as shiny as Anakin’s new arm. “Training.” She added in a fake little gasp, to make it at least _seem_ she was training hard.

Anakin looked puzzled. “But your trials are soon.”

“Exactly. I want to _pass_ them, you know.”

Anakin scoffed. “I think Master Windu has prepared you enough, don’t you?”

Valouryn _did_ think- she thought restlessly about all the time and devotion that Master Windu had poured into her over the last decade, and how it would be an utter disappointment if she failed her upcoming Jedi Trials. He was even reluctant to train her at first, and she had no other option but to show him her potential. Now was the chance of all chances to prove it to him, so Valouryn wasn’t taking her Jedi Trials lightly whatsoever.

“You always say that.” It was Valouryn’s turn to scoff. “You always tell other people to relax, and go absolutely nuts with training yourself.”

Anakin leaned back on the bench, positioning his prosthetic behind his head. “Oh, really? Who’s doing what right now?”

Valouryn rolled her eyes. “Just wait until your trials. I can see it now. You’ll be here every day, every hour-”

“I’m not _getting_ them,” Anakin huffed, his mood changing like the wind. “The _Council_ …” anger flared, but was put out by the watery blue of Anakin’s eyes. “…doesn’t think I’m ready.”

Valouryn stared at her brother in shock, her features twisted. He was, if anything, more than ready for his trials. The two of them have been the top of their class since their first year learning, and could be far more advanced in their skills had the Council not kept them with their age group. Master Windu told Valouryn once that he never doubted her capabilities- but that the Council wanted her and Anakin to fit in more with the Order as much as they could. To Valouryn, this was an excuse of a reason. She couldn’t possibly fit in less than she already did.

If anything, Anakin deserved the trials more than she did. He fought Count Dooku on Geonosis, for kriff’s sake. At the cost of half an _arm_.

“Obi-Wan is going to talk to the Council,” Anakin continued. “He’s come up with reasons why I should be a Knight instead of the trials.”

Valouryn nodded, following along. “So they’ll knight you without the trials?”

“They did with Obi-Wan,” Anakin said. “I’m hardly lacking anything, and we’re going to prove it to them. They need as many knights as they can get. They can’t exactly be picky when a war brews.”

“Especially after Geonosis.” If killing or fighting a Sith Lord was an automatic pass to be a Jedi Knight, Valouryn now wished she had had more of a shot at Dooku. Unlike a training droid, he had more than enough of a dark side for her insatiable Vaapad.

Anakin was silent for a moment, not wanting to relive the memory of his arm cleanly slicing off. Valouryn imagined how it must have felt- she had a lightsaber burn scar from a faulty exercise a couple years ago on her shoulder blade, a couple others littering her back. That, times a thousand, is what Anakin must have felt on Geonosis. It was something she was happy never having to experience, and hopefully never would.

  
“I won’t be here tomorrow,” Anakin said suddenly. “So I hope you pass. I know you’ve got it in you, Val.”  
  
Valouryn narrowed her eyes at Anakin. She wasn’t mad that he wouldn’t see her before or after her trials, but more concerned for all his running around, which had exceeded the norm lately. And the norm was a lot in the first place. “Where are you going this time?”  
  
Anakin shrugged. “Searching for parts. I’m making adjustments to the _Twilight_.”

Valouryn held her eye on Anakin for a couple of extra seconds. Most trials were at least four or five hours, and that was a wide time range for Anakin to be running around Coruscant. But at the end of the day, she couldn’t help if her brother ran off doing stupid stuff. 

The horizon of Coruscant began to dim, signaling the near end of another day, although Valouryn doubted she’d be getting much sleep that night. With a nod to Anakin and a warning in her eyes telling him to be safe, she left to her quarters. Along the way, Valouryn ran into nobody, and considered that to be a good thing. She didn’t mind talking to Anakin the least of all, but speaking about the trials seemed to only make them come sooner. And, as much as waiting hurt, Valouryn’s heart was in her stomach thinking about the possible outcomes. This was a trial that she could absolutely not fail.

***

That night was as restless as Valouryn. No matter what angle she positioned them, lights from Coruscant’s surface filtered through the thin temple blinds. Her room was illuminated red, blue, yellow, whatever colour the next speeder’s headlights were as they passed by in the sky. Valouryn still sacrificed the night trying to get some sleep, when usually she would stay up absurd hours and strategise or read. Unlike Anakin, she saw the joys in reading which were more, in his words, “hallucinating from letters”.

After a few on and off hours in her bed, Valouryn rose precisely one hour before dawn- the trials were early, which Val detested. Anakin was no doubt already gone on his way for “parts”. Valouryn had eventually decoded that for “I don’t want to tell you where I’m going, because you wouldn’t approve” a long time ago- probably around when he got back from Naboo. Suddenly, after that mission, he had a much greater need for metal.

Begrudgingly, Valouryn dressed in her robes from yesterday’s training. The fabric beneath them was a dark violet, and the outer layer was a brilliant indigo. Master Windu had tirelessly tried to convince Valouryn to wear classic, ascetic brown robes like his own, but there were no rules in place for the colour of the fabric, and she held a tight grip on whatever freedom she could get her hands on in the Order.

Valouryn slipped on her boots. They were tall and practical, and matched her robes. With her lightsaber around her belt, she made her way down the vacant temple halls, the short heels of her beloved boots leaving echoes in the dim corridor. The trials were held in the pits of the Jedi temple, and she had never gone past the door. This was going to be a surprise.

Valouryn knew she could be walking into anything. The trials were incredibly secretive- no one, not even her Master, told her what she was in for. All she was aware of was the harsh challenge awaiting her behind the large double doors down the end of the hallway that was otherwise long and absent of other doors or windows. By now, Valouryn was well beneath the surface.

Once at the thick wooden doors, she raised a fist to knock, but stopped herself before touching the splintered surface. These were _her_ trials. Without a second thought, she swung the door on the right open, feeling a brush of cool air that raised the hairs on her lower arms as she entered the illuminated room. Instinctively, Valouryn pulled her rolled up sleeves all the way down, so that they draped past her wrists.

The roof was the most striking feature, as it stood at most thirty metres high. Something told Valouryn that the roof, high as it was, was likely no higher than the surface of the ground floor. She credited this to the many stairs and ramped corridors she travelled to arrive.

It was wide, too. Valouryn wondered how much of the temple’s property this room took up as she walked one, then two hundred metres to the far wall where the main lighting was coming from. A stone staircase trailed up to a platform with the same types of chairs in the High Council room- and here were some members of the High Council in the trial room, including Valouryn’s own Master Windu. Her heart jumped a beat in her chest at the sight of him standing in the middle of the other two Jedi Masters.

Suddenly, Valouryn wasn’t feeling so bold.

“Padawan Skywalker,” Valouryn’s Master boomed, speaking normally, though his voice was jumping from wall to wall, meeting Valouryn’s ears multiple times. “You have arrived before us for your great trial. I assume you have come prepared.”

Valouryn’s already-sweating hand subconsciously gripped her cool lightsaber hilt as her Master continued to speak. The presence of three Jedi Masters made her feel justifiably small. “If you pass these trials, with your skills picked up through your years as a Padawan, you will be granted knighthood. I am confident I’ve taught you all I could, and that is why you are here today.”

Valouryn was listening intently, but clued in at the pause Master Windu took from his speech. “I’m ready.”

Her voice was quiet, but the room propelled it to Windu like wind. “These trials will replicate what you may find yourself dealing with in the field. You will begin by closing your eyes.”

Valouryn was expecting to start off a little more harshly, but kneeled to the ground nevertheless and shut her eyes, not letting go of her saber that still clung to her belt or second guessing the council’s methods. After a moment, a breeze swept Valouryn’s hair slightly behind her, but her braid was unmoving. In what felt like seconds, water seemed to cling to the air which Valouryn breathed, and the coolness of the dark room was overcome with hell-like heat.

Master Windu’s presence, along with the other Jedi Masters, faded away with the breeze. Valouryn questioned whether she was still even in the temple’s trial room, or on Coruscant at all. The temperature on her planet was much more regulated than this. How long had her eyes been closed?

The Force, which was silent until now, hummed from a distance, but was gloomy, like a cloud chasing a star, threatening rain. It wasn’t until this that Valouryn snapped her eyes open, because it was clear now that she could consider herself abandoned by her Master until the trial’s completion. Or, until Valouryn exhausted herself with failure.

The image that Valouryn laid her eyes upon triggered her stomach to sink deeper than the trial room. A too-blue sky, ultraviolet rays beating down from binary stars, and enough sand to fill a billion pairs of Valouryn’s boots. There was no mistaking this planet for anything except Tatooine.

Valouryn immediately stumbled upwards onto her feet, kicking sand behind her as she did so and looked around. She never pictured herself returning to this force forsaken planet, and it was at this moment she cursed the trials for allowing her to underestimate them. The first thing she did upon her realisation was search for the presence of her mother through the force- but soon remembered the events of the last time she visited the planet.

Her mother was dead. There was a desolate space in the force where Shmi Skywalker should have been, a white hole that seeped nothing but an endless pool of darkness into the force. It spread all around Valouryn, and screamed fear and anger in her ears no matter how much she tried drowning it out.

 _Embrace it,_ Valouryn thought. _Just like Master Windu taught you. Just like Vaapad_. If there was one thing that Master Windu understood, it was that Valouryn Skywalker was no stranger to fury, and he knew controlling it meant embracing it, or else it would consume her. These were her trials, and that was the knowledge she had to use to her advantage. 

So, she stood up, and brushed the sand off her robes the best she could.

As good as it felt to dwell on anger, eliminating it cleared the fog that manipulated the light side of the force, yet Valouryn still felt the ever-present darkness in the force coming closer from a distance. Except it wasn’t the memory of her late mother- it was something else. Foreign, yet familiar, raw cruelty. The origin of the ink spill left a scratch in the force that was tainted with pain from other beings, and it was getting closer. There was something new coming. She tried endlessly to channel her negative emotions into the force, sending them away like waves at a sea. A clear head would be essential for what was to come.

Valouryn began to climb the dune in front of her. She was unaware of direction, and Tatooine was vast enough to get lost in easily. She could be kilometres away from the nearest civilisation, for all she knew.

The stars beat down on Valouryn’s back as she trudged up the unusually tall sand dune. At the top, she could see a line of single file people marching her way from below the dune. They were too far away yet to know anything, but they all moved in unison, and most of the creatures were short, minus the odd tall form in the middle.

The dark side of the force radiated from them, fuzzy but fierce. There had to be at least thirty people in the line, and half of them were…

Valouryn’s heart jumped. Half of them were Zabrack.

 _What were Zabracks doing on Tatooine?_ Valouryn looked for a place to duck, but remembered that she was standing atop a vast sand dune in indigo robes. The Zabracks were climbing the long dune that she was standing on now, and Valouryn could finally make out the others in the line.

Children were encased between Zabracks. Their hands were behind their backs as the Zabracks in the line shoved them unwillingly forwards. Rage boiled through Valouryn and built pressure in her veins as she saw the long chain connecting each child to the next, weaving around the Zabracks.

Valouryn didn’t know the Zabracks were slavers. And what were they doing on Tatooine?

Valouryn knew that at the top of the dune the line of slavers and slaves climbed, that she was completely visible. With one hand clenched tightly around her saber on her belt, Valouryn raised a hand to the Zabrack in the lead, signalling for them to stop.

She wasn’t expecting it to work, but the Zabrack came to a complete halt, causing a domino effect in the line as the children bumped into each other. Was this Valouryn’s trial? Stopping slavers? It was peacekeeping, after all. Valouryn had been too caught up in the war ridden atmosphere of Coruscant to focus completely on other issues in the galaxy. Even slavery.

Suddenly, the fire in Valouryn flared. How dare the Jedi Council think it appropriate to send her to Tatooine for her trials? The exact planet where she was raised into slavery, and now faced it again at their will, was the planet she had to prove herself on? Against _Zabracks_ , the race of the Sith that killed Qui-Gon?

Valouryn’s fingers began to turn white as she unhooked her saber from her belt. This was a mockery of every single thing she has overcome to get to this point. Val felt like she was falling backwards into her past, experiencing her mother dying, Darth Maul killing her would-be Master, leaving her family for the Hutt clan- and landing exactly where she started, confused and bridled with rage at every injustice she had to face. All the memories from a decade ago were being slammed into her like a rogue speeder.

The first Zabrack was awaiting her words, Valouryn realised. She cleared her throat and yelled through the humid air. “Identify yourself!”

The Zabrack’s voice was raspy, either naturally or from days travelling in the sand. “On who’s authority, my dear?”

Valouryn ignited her lightsaber, the azure blade revealing the authority. Or so, Valouryn hoped. These were her trials, after all, and she was sure whatever could go wrong, would go wrong.

One by one, the Zabracks filtered out of the line of children and moved to the front, joining the first curious Zabrack. Each of them reached to their side, and each of them ignited a scarlet lightsaber. One held back, holding the line with the children.

Of _course_ it had to get worse.

Valouryn stood rooted in her place as the Zabracks eagerly ascended the rest of the steep dune. Val swung her lightsaber between her hands, nonchalant, until the first Zabrack had reached her with an unfathomable speed and raised his saber for an upper attack, which Valouryn quickly thwarted by slicing her blade clean through his orange chest as limbs and two halves of a body fell like rain around the Padawan. _Too easy,_ Valouryn thought as she used the force to lift the deceased’s lightsaber into her left hand, igniting it as well. She counted the rest of her perpetrators as they scaled the dune in much less time as the first- nine, plus the one distant Zabrack who held back the line of slaves.

This time, they attacked all at once. Valouryn sliced through the first two again, and met the third’s saber with her blue as they pressed their blades together. She could sense a heavy presence from behind her, and thrust her red blade through the chest of another. Three down.

Valouryn brought her newly acquired saber swiftly into the legs of the Zabrack she was in a saber stalemate with, and as he fell, she buried her own in his head. After taking a split second to recover and stand steady, the remaining five Zabrack circled her. Their yellow eyes blazed with ruthlessness as Valouryn tried to choose who to attack next.

Luckily, she didn’t have to, because the one she was facing broke into a run with their lightsaber whirling through the air. Valouryn closed her eyes for a split second, paused him with the force, and thrust her blue saber behind her with a heave, feeling it go through the Zabrack who tried attacking her from her back. Keeping it in place, she inched the Zabrack she had suspended in the air into the red blade with the force, and pushed their bodies into two other Zabracks who looked ready enough to attack. Six down, two preoccupied.

Valouryn turned around for the last lone Zabrack, but he appeared nowhere. Stunned, Valouryn looked over the edge of the dune that was behind where he once stood, but there was nothing but sand. The other two Zabrack were recovering from being hit with their dead brothers ten metres away, and Valouryn had completely lost track of the last one.

 _Later_. Right now, she could see the lightsabers reignite from the two Zabrack who were previously on the ground. They approached her, faces twisted identically in hatred, which was just what Valouryn needed to take them down. Valouryn sensed the move before it happened, and the first Zabrack leapt over Valouryn’s head as she swung one lightsaber up and met his brother roughly with the other. The screams that erupted from the first brother as his legs were cut clean from his body were drowned out between the screeching of red on red lightsaber blades running against each other. Twisting, Valouryn brought her second lightsaber up once it was free to meet with the second brother, overpowering him much more easily than with one hand.

Valouryn wasn’t just pressing down on him with strength, but with the force, too, and his face crumpled in pain as the lightsaber in his own hands was pressed slowly through his front.

Eight down.

Valouryn stopped to catch her breath as she observed the carnage around her. This was what being a Jedi was all about? Killing others in the name of peace was ultimately the most hypocritical thing Valouryn had ever heard- and yet the council worried about her making ‘attatchments’. Not leaving a trail of misery and mayhem wherever she went. Looking through rose-coloured glasses only meant that the Council was unable to see the blood on Valouryn’s hands that was the result of achieving peace.

The missing Zabrack still failed to return, so Valouryn walked back to the edge of the dune, away from the bodies of the Zabracks that she had killed, wondering what made her better than any of them. _Slavers,_ she told herself. _They truly deserved this_. Val’s next instinctual move was to check on the children, who were left with the last Zabrack that she had forgotten about while dueling his brothers. _Shoot_.

Valouryn reached the slope of the dune, and saw the line of children, of which there were maybe twenty of, sitting patiently in the sand. Val started down the dune before thinking, how did it make sense that they weren’t leaving? The Zabrack guarding them initially was nowhere in sight. Was it possible that he left with the other after watching her slaughter eight of their brothers?

No. Valouryn had grown familiar with the ways of the trials, and so far, she was facing every worst possible outcome. This should be no different.

Valouryn ran down the dune towards the chain of children. She wasn’t going to stand there and wait, that was for sure. These trials were long enough.

The children were all connected by a thin gray chain that entwined around their wrists. Valouryn wasted no time in cutting the first Twi’lek girl free with her lightsaber, who tried to hug her after but Valouryn shoved her away and quickly cut the binds on the next girl, a Yalaran.

 _Yalaran?_ Yalara’s inhabitants had gone extinct, and the only reason Valouryn even identified her was from pictures in the archives. The girl had silver skin that gleamed especially in Tatooine’s light, and gold horns graciously framing her hair. Not your everyday species, that was for sure.

Valouryn snapped back into focus, and wordlessly moved on to the next child when she heard another lightsaber ignite behind her. _Great._ She whipped around to face both of the surviving Zabrack brothers, and one was pointing his saber dangerously close to Valouryn’s chest. The Twi’lek and the Yalaran ran behind Valouryn, and she could feel a set of hands nervously gripping her waist. Her own fingers trembled around her saber as she made one swift move to deflect the Zabrack’s blade, quickly losing sight of the other one as he leapt behind her.

The blades clashed as Valouryn struggled with the girl on her waist, wondering which one of them had grabbed on to her but had no time to look. This Zabrack, like all the others, was strong and lethal. Each time their lightsabers met, Val grimaced under the weight thrust upon her, but followed up with a determination to protect the slaves.

The next time Valouryn met the Zabrack’s blade, she twisted the fight to face the line of slaves, and her heart deflated as she saw the other Zabrack thrust his lightsaber through the Twi’lek girl’s chest. Valouryn watched as her tiny figure fell to the ground, her glimmer in the force extinguished like a wet matchstick. 

Valouryn let out an excruciating yell as she kneeled to the ground for just a split second, allowing the Yalaran girl to jump securely on her back, and continued with a line of aggressive strikes to the Zabrack, each blow sending him stumbling in the sand. He couldn’t get a hit in edgewise, and Valouryn let down all her defenses to deliver one final, forceful assault to the murderer, swiftly sweeping her lightsaber diagonally across his chest. The blade of his own weapon came hazardously close to her head, but the life left the Zabrack’s fingers before he could strike, the blade vanishing before it could meet the heads of the girls.

She could feel herself driving in the middle of the road. A haze of darkness had impaired her vision temporarily, and Valouryn had to stop and concentrate to regain her balance in the force, banishing the unwanted cloud of hatred. Was it unwanted, though? Vaapad was supposed to work best when aligning with the opponent’s darkness. But with her own, she had control.

Valouryn shook her head, making sure the Yalaran had a firm grasp on her back. That was a ridiculous thought. Vaapad hadn’t failed her yet, for all the years she’d been practising. Master Windu always made it explicitly clear that Vaapad’s purpose was to connect to the opponent’s rage and smother it with light. _That_ was how to win a duel.

The final Zabrack hadn’t made a move on Valouryn yet- he was busy running his lightsaber through the collection of children chained together. No, Valouryn thought. This didn’t make any sense. As nauseating of a thought that it was, he was a slaver, so why destroy his own income? One slave was an incredible asset, and the Zabrack had these ones dropping like flies. Before Valouryn knew it, she was sprinting over to him, lightsaber raised as she readied a strike before one of the remaining children near the end of the line felt his wrath. Confusion struck Valouryn when her blade was met with a red one, but the child still had another blade running through their stomach.

Valouryn noticed the hilt. It was double bladed.

A flurry of curses left Valouryn’s mouth as she kicked the Zabrack’s legs, causing his attention to be paid to her, and not the few remaining children. Some were Huttese, some were Basic, and all were directed at the excuse of a being she fought with all her strength. This Zabrack was different- his form was forceful, random, and Valouryn struggled to follow the pattern of his moves with her Vaapad. The way he fought-his style-it was foreign, but concurrently all too familiar. Valouryn was never taught in such a way, but a mass déjà vu was brought upon her with every squeal their lightsabers made as they touched. The intricate tattoos on his body, black shapes seething through red skin, the dark, airy robe that followed his moves…

Valouryn pictured this very saber killing Master Qui-Gon on Naboo. This was Darth Maul.

In her moment of distraction, he offered an offensive blow from above, and Valouryn struggled to push his lightsaber back as the Yalaran gave a frightened shriek from behind.

“Give up, Jedi,” Maul snarled. Valouryn knew this was impossible. Maul was dead. He died on Naboo. Yet here he was, both halves of him back together, beating the kriff out of Valouryn.

Maul let go of the relentless pressure he had dawned on Valouryn, only to send her flying behind her, down another sand dune. The Yalaran and her both yelped as they tumbled down the hill, sand being the only thing breaking their fall at the least. By the time they stopped rolling, Maul was the size of a credit standing atop the dune, and Valouryn covered the Yalaran’s eyes as he mercilessly slaughtered the last of the children. _No._

Did this mean that Valouryn failed? The slaves were dead. She didn’t bring peace, not to anybody. They were all dead.

The Yalaran groaned on the ground next to Val, disgruntled but intact from the tumble. Almost all dead. She still had something- someone- to fight for. To save from this violent wreckage.

“On my back,” Valouryn ordered the Yalaran, who was still recovering and now starting to shed tears. “Don’t do that. No, no _no_. It’ll be fine, because you’re with me, okay?”

The Yalaran girl began to shake, her silver skin becoming shiny and slack. Her horns, both pointed on her head and shielding her cheeks over her ears, shone by the starlight. Everything about the look on her face screamed, I want to go home. Valouryn knew, though, that if she was Yalaran, she didn’t have a home. Yalara was raided and ruined too many years ago to count, and this girl was a rarity. Which was all the more reason to keep her safe. “What’s your name?”

A cough escaped her gray lips before answering in the galaxy’s smallest voice. “…Radia.”

Valouryn uncertainly ran a hand through Radia’s obsidian hair, which fell behind her back around her gold horns. “I can keep you safe, but you need to hang on to me good, okay, Radia?”

Valouryn couldn’t tell if Radia nodded or was shaking, but she interpreted it as a yes and turned back around, letting the child hop onto her back and securing her arms below her collarbone. Val sat in the hot sand, staring up at Maul who took his time to walk down the dune. She almost got up to prepare an attack, but stopped herself.

 _What would a Jedi do_?

Val was aware of Maul’s tricky dark side relations, which he splattered everywhere when they fought- it was what made him so difficult to follow with Vaapad. Valouryn sat with her hands on her knees, cross legged, and closed her eyes. And she meditated.

She hoped this didn’t show desperation, but that she held onto a Jedi mindset. She could sense Maul’s inky presence in the force, staining everything he touched. His unbridled anger was too easy to grasp, and Valouryn could feel his own desperation to defeat her. And… something else. It was personal.

Maul had style, and this was easy to feel through the force. He knew who she was. She could feel the pulsing of his vendetta, vibrant and thick through the force, and a hatred that wasn’t meant for her, but someone she was close to.

  
_Obi-Wan Kenobi._

  
Maul’s murderer- or so she thought- himself. Did Maul somehow think that her death would be some sick kind of revenge in her brother’s Master? She concentrated harder, willing herself gently to dive further into Maul’s darkness. In the mist, she saw a lightsaber battling another blue blade, but after a moment she realised this wasn’t her battle. Tatooine faded away as Valouryn was whisked to Naboo, just over a decade ago.

Images of people flashed in her mind. Maul looked somehow more ravaging than he was now, killing children. Flashes of his feral face struck like lightning in the force and left sizzling burns of permanent darkness in its wake, in Valouryn’s mind, in the battle she was half-witnessing. Then, she saw a face she hadn’t seen for years upon years.

_Master Qui-Gon?_

Valouryn felt like she was in a body that was not her own. There was a persistent pulse of light with every breath of the force, despite the harrowing images in front of her. Qui-Gon was sitting and meditating one minute, and the next was duelling Maul. Then meditating. Then duelling. This vision was a dice that refused to stop rolling and choose an outcome as the Sith Lord and Knight overpowered each other in different scenes, constantly changing.

Until the hilt of the red blade buckled against Qui-Gon’s chin, and nestled itself in his chest. Valouryn felt herself screaming, but couldn’t hear anything except an approaching fulfillment of a certain vengeful vendetta.

Valouryn’s eyes snapped open as she ignited her lightsaber.

First, the blade sprouted out of the hilt, then hissed as it split the intricate hilt of Maul’s own twin blade that was mere centimetres from Valouryn’s chin. It glowed bright as it powered through, not being stopped by the wall of the kyber crystal as it shot into Maul’s neck, covering the grin on his face with a sheet of fear that glossed past his yellow eyes and Zabrack horns. In Maul’s eyes, she was Qui-Gon being met with a killing blow, the same blow to the chin in the works of being used again. In her own eyes, she was Valouryn Skywalker, and in her heart she had her own vendetta being fulfilled. She knew it was wrong to be satisfied from this. She knew these were her trials.

She didn’t care. Maul deserved to die. Pulling the same dirty move, _twice?_ And it wasn’t like the Council could tell that she felt _good_ about doing this. After switching off her lightsaber, Valouryn pasted a frown to her face as the tattooed Zabrack crumpled lifelessly to the ground. _If only this was the way it went on Naboo._ Sometimes, Valouryn longed for Qui-Gon to have been her Master when Master Windu was just too much. Not that she didn’t appreciate all Windu did, but he approached Valouryn as a problem that needed fixing, not a Padawan needing training. In fact, Master Qui-Gon had shown her more sincerity in the short time they were acquainted than Master Windu had in a whole decade.

Radia jumped off Valouryn’s back, and up until then Valouryn had forgotten she was even there. Her sharp, gold Yalaran horns traced her cheeks with worry, and as Valouryn looked around the vast desert surrounding the two, she realised they were the only ones left. However long they had been fighting, at least thirty people were dead. Fifteen to twenty- Valouryn didn’t bother counting the motionless bodies of children scattered across the sand- of which that really mattered. To Valouryn, slavers were expendable. If her job as a Jedi was to bring peace to the galaxy, killing slavers seemed the way to do it. Of course, she wouldn’t let the council know that.

They were _armed_. They were in the process of stealing children. What was Maul doing on Tatooine again, anyway? No one would venture on that blazing planet unless they had a reason. This was all hypothetical, of course. Valouryn wasn’t even sure this was real. It could all just be a dream. Maybe this was her Trial of Spirit. Maul _definitely_ couldn’t be real, because he was dead. So this was a fragmented reality moulded in the hands of the Council, with the sole intent to test her. Was this even Tatooine? Debunking where she really was seemed too obvious to be a Trial of Insight. The other Trials, Courage, Skill and Flesh, she hadn’t really known much about, but figured the name explained it all. Maybe she had to show proficient skill in something, and do it… courageously? Flesh was definitely something physical. Valouryn wished the Council had given her a breakdown of the Trials in advance, even though they were supposed to remain mysterious. She hated surprises almost more than the sand planet she was standing on. Which, in itself, _was_ a surprise. She cursed at her luck.

“I want to go home,” said the Yalaran. “Please?”

Valouryn snapped her attention back to Radia. The girl’s silver eyes were threatening to spill tears, filled to the rim, and her silver face was no longer a solid silver, but mottled and cracking under her skin. Scratch that. If there was one thing Valouryn hated more than surprises, it was children crying. Not because she was sympathetic- the Padawan struggled to put herself in the shoes of someone much younger. To Valouryn, children were the real aliens of the galaxy. It was this exact reason that made Valouryn totally and completely lost. She could search every inch of the Force and never in a million light years find the right words to give to a child- especially a crying one.

Force, please don’t let this kid be essential to the next part of her trials.

“…Okay, then,” Valouryn said, eyeing the Yalaran, trying to analyze her even though the effort was fruitless. “Is it very far from here?”

The Yalaran’s head bobbed up and down, the tears partially dissipating. At the very least, the normal matte silver colour had returned to Radia’s cheeks. Valouryn couldn’t help but express a sigh as her eyes fluttered slightly upwards in a roll. “Well, what are you waiting for? Lead the way.”

Radia practically flew through the sand, and Valouryn had to recall the best way to sprint through sand she had used as a child herself- digging the tips of her feet into a dune and practically leaping up. Now, with the freedom of her Jedi flexibility and stamina, this job was much easier. And this child, whoever she was, seemed to be wowed by Valouryn’s take on the sand- so much that she toned it down to a jog not to overwhelm the kid.

\--

Tatooine’s binary suns collapsed in a heap beneath the sand dunes that Radia had dragged Valouryn on for hours on end. Despite the trauma she had endured on the dusty planet, Valouryn was glad to be so accustomed to long walks across sand leading to nowhere. It almost felt as though they were going in circles, because the scenery never changed- just sand for kilometres on end. Memories bourgeoned in Val’s mind of her walking the Tatooine streets in the same time of evening, making runs for Watto before close, then sleeping with her mother through the humid night.

Looking at Radia, still walking with a skip in her steps, Valouryn felt a stream of compassion flow through her veins. Maybe _Radia_ was the key to the trials. Here she was, young and full of life, with a future in front of her brighter than the suns. If only she could get the Yalaran offworld, she’d be helping someone out. Maybe the Order hadn’t strayed so far from their values of offering peace, after all.

The chill carried in the night air came not long after, driving the hairs on Valouryn’s arms that were exposed by her tunic sleeves to stand on end. Her feet were now dragging in the sand, allowing the small grains to infiltrate the miniscule rips in the tips of her boots, and sneak between her toes in the most irritating way possible. 

The Yalaran was having no trouble at all, leaping through the stuff like sugar in her bare feet. Val resisted the urge to stop and empty her boots as they trekked on, while starting to feel the effects of hunger and dehydration racking her body. The Yalaran, it seemed, didn’t show it if she felt it. Their roles were beginning to swap as Radia would pause for slight moments so Valouryn could catch up. This was backwards. Val was a _Jedi._ She was supposed to be the strong one. She didn’t feel any different than usual, but this Yalaran girl had to be on spices if she still had energy by now.

Valouryn was about to convince Radia to stop and rest with her despite her desire to end the trials sooner rather than later, when Radia pointed to a light glow in the distance above the next dune. It was dim, sure, but against the black sky battered with dark clouds concealing the starlight, purely visible in the distance. 

“Not much farther, and we’ll be there,” the girl said with her thick Outer Rim accent, somewhat similar to Valouryn’s, but choppier and less like the pronounced, aristocratic accent of Coruscant that surrounded Val at the Temple. She didn’t ignore the fact that it was only another thing that set her aside from her fellow Jedi, and something the other younglings thought to shame her for. Val didn’t forget that aspect, either. The only pro was the uninterpretable flourish of Huttese swears that would escape her lips whenever she was bashed for the way she spoke.

The light, once the two reached the top of the dune, was revealed to be emanating from a large, stone horizontal building with towers on each end that hung over the rest of the property. The architecture, even though it was limited by distance, was extravagant in the pillars that lined the property, the most illuminated part. Once closer, she could identify grates between them all but the centre one, which must have been the entrance.

There was one thought that never left her mind. _Who in their right mind would live here?_ This property was far too big to house one Yalaran girl and her family, and didn’t seem to be near any civilization, at least not from the way they came. This had to be the residence of a larger organisation, thus sending chilling thoughts through Valouryn’s mind. Nothing good could come from a group organisation in which a possibly orphaned child lived in.

At the front, there was a gate that opened with just one touch from Radia to a scanner on the pillar, as if she had done this a thousand times. It opened with a groan, and there was a stone path leading inside the building that stood just above the sandy terrain. Now, Val was _happy_ to let Radia go first, because she felt as invasive as ever walking into this unknown structure. Radia strut inside with confidence, reassuring Valouryn that she wasn’t returning the child to a bad setting.

Inside was cool and dark, and no windows lined the walls. In fact, the open doors behind them were the only source of light at all, barely depicting the high, curved ceiling despite the square, stone oriental theming from the outside.

“Radia,” Valouryn called, losing sight of the girl but her voice unwavered. “Are there, I don’t know, _lights_ in this joint?”

The hope that Radia had actually gone to find some kind of lamp quickly diminished as the double doors behind Valouryn shut with a breezy slam. She whipped around, hand already having found the hilt of her lightsaber, and upon seeing nothing returned to face her original position. “Radia!”

A trembling silence ensued Valouryn’s calls, and she could feel her legs begin to shake as her knees weakened. _Stop it. Now is not the time to panic. These are your trials. Fear goes to the dark side the dark side isn’t the answer don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic-_

The rush of fright suddenly captured Valouryn’s entire body as she froze in a mask of dread upon the all too familiar ignition of a lightsaber blade. It was not her own. There was no fear in a lightsaber in the same room as her, rather than the red glow that now provided the only light for the otherwise pitch black room, and the faces that it revealed not ten steps away.

Radia was being clutched tight by her shoulders and the Sith blade gracefully tracing her neck with a blazing heat. Fingers of a black glove, made of synth-leather, pirouetted the hilt, and even through gloves Val could see the undying grip of the hand. The hand extended to the rest of the arm, and up the glove that was accessorised with three silver clasps on the sides. The glove was attached to a sturdy shoulder, attached to a neck, and finally Valouryn found herself staring into the acidic golden eyes of her brother.

“Anakin,” Valouryn wheezed, only half the word coming out, the other half lost to her exasperation.

She received no answer as the hum of the blade was the only sound filling the vast room. This was, by _far_ , worse than having to duel Maul, or his double, or whatever that thing was- it seemed by this point the Council was drawing situations out of a hood to mock Valouryn with. Not only that, but Anakin was holding a _red blade_ to a child’s _neck_. Never in a million years would her brother do that. If this weren’t actually happening, but a story told at another time, she would laugh at the pure idiocy of the tale. This… this was nuts.

Words swam through her head, forming a million questions at once, but she finally settled on, “Why is it red?”

Anakin’s eyes shot fury as he grappled a squirming Radia under his crimson blade. “I think it suits me.”

Valouryn’s breath caught in her throat. This was unreal. Literally. This scene before her was created by the Council, right? This wasn’t _actually_ happening. But the undeniable shiver that sprinted down her back and whimpers from Radia above the saber hissing begged to differ. It felt real when she absolutely obliterated a dozen Zabracks. What was stopping them for getting Anakin to hop in her trials? He was going somewhere, he said, before her trials began. No, no, no. He wouldn’t deceive his _sister_ like that, would he?

Either way, there was no faking the sulphuric stare that beamed lasers through Valouryn’s skin. “Anakin,” she tried again. “Let her go. She’s done nothing wrong.”

“She’s done _everything_ wrong!” Anakin thundered, making the Force itself tremble in fear and uncertainty. “You have no idea. No idea what’s going on here. But you need to know.”

Utterly lost from Anakin’s train of thought, Valouryn focused on the one thing she _did_ know- the Force. They could have been hidden, but she felt no bad intentions off of Radia. Anakin, on the other hand, had a weakly forged Force signature that strayed from his good-natured, brave-but-stupid original one.

The Force told her something else, too. This Anakin wasn’t one for patience. He had two aims, and the stronger one was to kill Radia. The second was to tell her why, and Valouryn knew he wouldn’t do that in reverse order. Again, these were her trials- the Jedi lived by not killing an unarmed criminal by any means, no matter what. So feeling that Anakin was about to press his blade deep into the Yalaran’s neck, Valouryn knew she couldn’t let that happen.

With a yank of the Force, Valouryn dragged Radia to the floor as Anakin jerked his saber to where she once was trapped in his grip, then pulled her through the air into her own arms and ignited her lightsaber once again, the blue glow contrasting the red in the darkness.

“That was a mistake,” Anakin seethed, stepping forward. With every menacing foot of her brother’s that touched the ground, Valouryn took hers back until her spine met the coolness of the doors. Fruitlessly, she tried the door handles to open, knowing they wouldn’t and not being surprised at the failed result. Anakin grew closer, his eyes blazing as much as his saber. If this was her brother, when did he bleed it red? 

Valouryn was running out of time, because she knew once she engaged, the fight wouldn’t stop until someone was injured, or worse, dead. “Radia,” Valouryn said, a warning sign in her voice. That was all the Yalaran needed to hear to know the elder wanted to repeat the technique used with the Zabracks earlier that day, and hop on the back of Valouryn, who was trying her best to mentally prepare herself to duel her brother.

The words Yoda taught to every year of Jedi crossed her mind. _Do or do not. There is no try_. Don’t think of Anakin as family, think of him as Sith. There was a near extinct child to protect.

But Anakin was her brother.

It hit Valouryn there like a brick as Anakin closed in. Of course the Council would pit her against Anakin. He was, without a doubt, her strongest attachment. Force forbid a Jedi have any attachments get in the way of the main goal, which in this case, seemed to be saving Radia. To do so meant sacrificing Anakin, her family, her last lifeline to her old life.

Their lightsabers clashed in a spurt of electricity. Anakin had made the decision for her.

Valouryn was no stranger to Anakin’s form five, but forced herself to follow the limitations of Soresu. She would sacrifice her proficiency in Vaapad to try and spare her brother, in hoped his aggressive tactics would tire him out before something bad happened.

Radia’s fingers dug into her shoulders as she met another brash slam from the ruby blade. How did the dark side cling to her brother this much? There was no way the Council would sacrifice his safety in the name of her trials- or so she hoped. Either way, it was unquestionable that it was the dark side twisting trails around Anakin. There had better be some way of fixing this after everything was over.

If she made it out alive.

Another strike from Anakin brought Valouryn back to the present. Her gloveless hands were growing slick around her hilt, and with one more assault from Anakin, she could feel him breaking through her unpolished Soresu. It was something she had picked up after Vaapad, which was what Master Windu chose to teach her privately after getting the simplicity of Form One out of the way. He could sense the darkness in her, he told Valouryn, and since she sucked at meditation, she needed another outlet. As insulting as that was, she couldn’t deny her Master was right. Vaapad enlightened her skills and brought Valouryn a peace of mind- something meditation usually failed to do. From day one of Vaapad, lightsaber combat had become Val’s saving grace as a Jedi.

Decidedly, it would be her saving grace against Anakin, too.

Vaapad was much more fluid in movement from the mechanical Soresu, and Valouryn could feel the tenseness in the Force as Anakin had to abruptly adjust his attacks to the unpredictable movements of her Vaapad. It was as if Valouryn was now clicked into place, as her brother became just another training partner to overcome.

He was absolutely overflowing with the dark side of the Force. So much, that Valouryn could grab it at any angle and fuel her own moves. This was so much more natural- swing, duck, block, spin, duck, swing. If Anakin had a goal, she could have one too- saving Radia. Between delicate moves, Valouryn made sure never to expose her back.

Val started to blink for longer periods of time as she became more in-tune with the annoying repetition of Anakin’s moves. She wouldn’t let him have what he wanted. He might as well have been blasting a ray shield, because Valouryn’s Vaapad so far was impenetrable. As her swings became slicker, Anakin began to be automatically pushed back by the speed, and his sister gleamed at the sound of him gasping for air between strikes. It was odd for her brother to tire out so fast- she had sparred with him enough to know that. Each of his hits became weaker and weaker, until a jab at her flank ended up in Valouryn making a quick grab for Anakin’s left wrist, squeezing hard until his fingers uncurled from the hilt, and didn’t let go until it clanged to the floor.

With a simple Force shove back, Valouryn pulled the weapon to her hand, about to attach it to her belt when she noticed the anomaly. She had picked up Anakin’s lightsaber before. It wasn’t slick, smooth, or…

She held it up in the light of her own weapon. _Gold_? This wasn’t Anakin’s lightsaber at all. She looked towards the menacing stare on her brother’s hollow face as he dived forward with a hand out.

Just as she felt a brush of the Force tangle around her neck, Valouryn didn’t hesitate to do the unexpected and reignite the crimson red blade into the chest of whatever creature called itself her brother. The eyes dimmed, shocked at either the possibility Valouryn would do that to her brother or that she had seen through the illusion. Because the dying shell in front of her was not Anakin.

Before her opponent, whatever it was, could hit the ground, a white light erupted from directly behind Valouryn, consuming her vision and the space around her. For a moment, her skin burned, and the tight grip of Radia disappeared without warning, and Val felt like her stomach had done twenty somersaults off the Jedi temple by the time the heat ended seconds later, although it felt like a short eternity.

Even though there was no noise before, Valouryn’s surroundings were now silent. More still, if you would. The dark side was gone. Radia was gone. The Padawan found herself on her hands and knees of a slippery floor, unlike the stone of the building or sands of Tatooine.

“You may open your eyes, Knight.”

Valouryn hadn’t even realised they had been closed.

She was back in the same room from before her trials. There was no longer sand in her boots, no gold-hilted lightsaber in her grip, but her hair was still a mess and her skin sticky with sweat. The temperature of her surroundings had warmed considerably, but coolness latched to the basement’s air. She was closer to the door now, and the Masters had left their seats to stand before her.

Maul was gone. Radia was gone. Anakin was gone. No, Anakin was never here. Around her, scattered on the stone tiles, were broken droid parts. Some sparked, and others were hanging together by threads of wires. There were easy lightsaber sears in the metal, and with a panicked hand, Val searched her belt to find her saber right where it should have been.

Her brain must have been running ten seconds behind, because it was a moment before she looked up from her Master’s boots, and up the fabric of his robes, and laid eyes upon the rare excuse of a smile stroked on his face as his ~~Padawan~~ _former_ Padawan registered the last word that rolled off his lips. “Well done. You have successfully demonstrated your ability to apply confidence and vast skill, on the dunes, faced your physical limits on your travels, acted against your attachments, and gained insight through intricate detail. You have shown yourself to be more than worthy of this title. Master Plo will guide you to an upper meditation room, where you will spend a rotation reflecting on your accomplishments. I’ll see you then.”

“Master,” Valouryn spoke, trying to think of what to say, but wanting to say something, _anything_ , about the ordeal or her success or was he personally proud of her growth? Could he say it?

“You may drop the formalities, Valouryn,” Mace said, whisking by his former Padawan without a second glance. “…You have _earned_ the right to do so.”

And he was gone.

Mace Windu’s heavy words sat still and chilled in his former Padawan’s mind. That, that title would take some getting used to. But saying she had earned the right… well, it was as prideful as her Master usually got, especially in front of others. Then she remembered, almost hitting herself, that pride was an emotion, that led to the dark side, blah de blah de blah.

She felt prideful within herself. And here she was, using the Light. Valouryn learned a while ago not to be sassy with her Master, though, because in his mind, sassiness also led to the dark side by the level he was against it. She almost felt sympathy for his inability to take a joke- in her mind, frustration was an emotion, too. And instead of letting it out with the Force, it wasn’t unusual for him to let it out on her. _Extra meditation today. Why don’t you go help the kitchen staff instead of sitting around? You spend far too much time forming attachments instead of letting them go, Padawan._

The last one, although she passed her trials, still felt unresolved. Attachments were her lifeline. As Master Plo, who had certainly not been present at the beginning of the ordeal, escorted her out of the chambers, Valouryn craved to see her brother and not a droid’s best imitation.

“Your Master is correct,” Plo Koon spoke, his words rustic. “You have done well today.”

“He’s not my Master anymore,” Valouryn said, only slightly startling Plo with her ability to speak her mind when desired. Saying it out loud was an almost liberating feeling- Mace Windu was not her Master anymore. No one would tell her to meditate or isolate or train more or focus more except for herself. Valouryn Skywalker had no Master.

Master Plo nodded thoughtfully, digesting the young Knight’s words. “Right you are. I hope you are ready for the responsibility of being a Knight.”

“As I’ll ever be.”

“And with war on the horizon?” Plo watched as a sliver of doubt shaded Valouryn’s eyes. “We are mobilizing as we speak. This... conflict will not be short, nor pleasant.”

There were stakes to the war. Valouryn knew that. She was told numerous times by the Council that as a Jedi, they were peacekeepers, and right now that meant playing the defensive in a galactic war, in favour of the people. They were on the right side- because the wrong side had a Sith Lord holding the reins. No matter what the Separatists stood for, it wasn’t freedom or justice. It was their own order. Just a harsher reality than what they already lived.

“You will soon be given a legion of clones to act as General for,” Plo expanded, lightening the conversation. “You aren’t Commander anymore. The four hundred ninety-eighth battalion will soon be expecting you to lead them. And the Council expects you to be ready, as well.”

They arrived at the meditation room, having already gone up countless sets of stairs. Outside was still dark, and Valouryn couldn’t tell if the trials only took a split second or the whole day. “Master Plo,” Valouryn began, adjusting her robes and crossing the doorway without the Council Member. “When have I ever let you down?”

Plo Koon gave another thoughtful nod. “Never. I hope you keep it that way, Skywalker, because you have a great deal of things about to come to you.”

And with that, Valouryn was left to meditate.

\--

Valouryn sunk in to the room’s dimness with surprising ease. This would be fine. She just had to meditate on the trial’s events for a whole rotation. Someone would come fetch her afterwards.

The room was cramped, that was for sure. The ceiling was high, but the walls weren’t nine feet apart. The clari-crystalline panes that admitted a view to the outside sky only circled the top of the chamber, and Valouryn would have to jump if she wanted to see Coruscant and not just the sky. She wasn’t sure if it was the room’s nature, but the Force felt confined, and pressurized. Stuffy. She almost had a headache from the way it pounded against her mind.

Meditation _sucked_.

Sure, she could do it if she forced herself. But not for long. It was far too easy for Valouryn’s thoughts to wander, and whenever she cleared her mind, more thoughts would seep in to replace the old ones. It was impossible for her brain to shut down. The Force flowed through her like a busy highway, not a peaceful stream like how Master Windu would endlessly describe it. The worst session she had with her Master was on her fourteenth birthday (or the general week it would fall upon, seeing as she was unaware of the exact date). It was the same circumstances of her birth that had caused a fight to brew between her and another Padawan her year, Farlia. He mocked her origins and her Outer Rim accent. She told him his name sounded like a disease. He sprayed her with water, so she threw the first punch, and since then, she stopped going to the Room of a Thousand Fountains during the day. And as if that weren’t enough, it had earned her a nine-hour straight meditation lesson, courtesy of Master Windu. It was, quite possibly, her worst birthday ever.

Focus. Valouryn tapped in to the Force, trying to match its pace. Getting in tune was the easy part. Keeping it was harder. Valouryn unhooked her lightsaber from her belt, not to use it but to give her hands something to do. It didn’t take long for Master Windu to stray from normal meditation, and although he heightened her hours of practise, Valouryn remembered the day he started her on Vaapad. Master Windu was always looking for ways to let Valouryn expel her emotions into the force, and practising combat was the best way they had found so far. Valouryn and the Force got along the most when she was holding a lightsaber.

So, twiddling the saber in her hands wasn’t a total solution, but it kept her level.

Valouryn wondered if the Masters were watching her. Closing her eyes, she searched the Force for devices in the room, and was surprised to find none. She didn’t think Master Windu trusted her enough to meditate on her own, to be completely honest. And, seeing the rate she was going, he was right.

She scooted back so her spine aligned with the wall, and leaned back comfortably. This was better. Instead of staying upright, the only thing Valouryn focused her attention on was the lightsaber hilt in her hands and the Force singing hoarsely in her ears. She fell into it, and danced around her bonds with Anakin, a strong cable, and Master Windu, a tattered rope. Valouryn was extra careful not to poke that one. He probably wouldn’t take the disruption lightly, and Val wondered how long it would be for the training bond to disintegrate, or if it would stay. She might not be seeing much of her old Master once the fighting in the war commenced, but maybe she would be seeing more of him. Only time would tell. 

Soon Valouryn fell into a rhythm. A flip of the hilt would follow a jump of the Force, but she let in envelope her and peel away a layer or two. One more thing that led Valouryn to struggle was the she never left herself to be vulnerable, especially when she meditated with Master Windu. It was better to have control over the Force than to let it have control over her, which was one thing Master Windu always said, although he never intended to hold Valouryn back from meditating.

At some point, Valouryn’s slick lightsaber hilt slipped through her fingers and clattered to the floor as she fell asleep. It was definitely a good thing there were no Masters watching her, or they would probably be disappointed in her lack of effort. But that possibility was clouded by the overwhelming exhaustion that Valouryn had endured today. After crawling across countless Tatooine sand dunes, one becomes exhausted, Force-sensitive or not.

The chamber door creaked open exactly one rotation later, as the Council promised. Light streamed inside, only shadowed by the Master that had opened the door in the first place. It wasn’t enough to phase the sleeping Padawan-Knight slumped against the wall.

“Already sleeping on the job, I see.”

A shiver was sent through the Force along with that statement, and Valouryn awoke more annoyed than anything, but lost any remnant of sleep once she saw the figure holding out a hand above her.

“Master,” she greeted, not loving the condition on which he found her in. “I was just-”

“No explanation needed,” Obi-Wan said, resting a hand on Valouryn’s shoulder. “It is never particularly an easy task to reflect for a whole day.”

“So I still pass?”

Obi-Wan chuckled. “Force, yes, you still pass. Taking a short break after your exhilarating trials should have no impact on your ability of being a Jedi Knight.”

Obi-Wan took Valouryn around some corners, and although she wasn’t familiar with the corridors, she knew they were approaching the Council Chambers soon, judging by the polished walls and untrampled bloodred carpet the pair stepped upon. Valouryn decided against telling Obi-Wan that she had definitely taken more than a _short break_ , when she couldn’t have meditated for more than an hour before falling asleep. It just had that effect on her. She would vent about it to Anakin later.

The Council Chamber doors were closed. It was nighttime, but when the doors opened courtesy of Obi-Wan’s Force-prod, half a dozen members were already present, including Master Windu and Yoda. Shaak Ti stood on Yoda’s side, in a flowing brown robe, holding a small, wooden box of some sort. They were all standing in shadows- the room was dark. There was no artificial light anywhere- just windows with city light streaming through.

“Welcome, young Skywalker,” Yoda croaked. The doors behind Valouryn swept shut as Obi-Wan joined the other Masters. “Not easy it is, to pass the Trials. Shown exemplary virtues, you have. Officially knight you now, Master Windu shall.”

Valouryn knew well enough not to speak at all during this stage of her knighting. Her trials had been pretty chaotic, her day long meditation only lasted an hour, but she was going to keep her mouth shut long enough for her kriffing braid to drop.

She was so close.

Wordlessly, Master Windu stalked up to Valouryn, who kneeled instinctively. Hos robes flushed around his legs, and Valouryn closed her eyes when she saw his violet lightsaber ignite next to her head. She didn’t want to stare at her Master’s knees for that long, and didn’t wasn’t to see his lightsaber blade go anywhere near her head.

Her heart started beating too fast, and she was really counting on Mace not to miss. Her Padawan braid was draped over her shoulder, while the rest of her half-braided hair was tucked behind her ears. One more moment of the tip of his saber lingering in front of her face, Valouryn would have expected her eye makeup to melt down her cheeks, but in one swift motion, the heat went away and her hair got just a bit lighter.

Valouryn opened her eyes to her braid on the floor, and brought her hand up to the hot, singed end of the chunk of hair that had been cut. It was a centimetre from her head. If Master Windu wasn’t Force-sensitive, there was no way he could have done that perfectly.

Shaak Ti slipped Valouryn the box, and then backed away. Val knew what to use it for- she slipped away her braid, a token of her Padawanship, a medal of her Trial, and snapped the box shut. And, without a word, she left the Council chambers as a Jedi Knight.

\--

On her way back down the hall, Valouryn saw Anakin. He looked happier than two days ago. She couldn’t imagine how she looked, after being exposed to fake elements of Tatooine and an imposter droid that cloaked itself as the one person she would die for, then sleeping for nearly a whole day. There was a clear difference now, Valouryn noticed, between the droid and her brother, although she didn’t distinguish it at the time. His Force signature in the trials was forged, but here, his signature was potent and brash. If the Force was Kamino, his signature was a tidal wave. As he walked by his sister in the dark hallway, his braid swished. It had gotten long.

Valouryn smiled at him. It was a gesture long forgotten to anybody they knew except each other, and they only used it when it was genuine. And, Force forbid Anakin supply anything but a smirk when he was mildly enthused. But Valouryn smiled for her own accomplishment, and whatever predicament Anakin had gotten into to wind up in the chambers so late at night. But when Anakin walked out of the chambers ten minutes later to Valouryn waiting for him, his braid was gone and in his hands was a box. And for what seemed like the first time in years, Anakin smiled back.

**Author's Note:**

> so I typed all these notes out and then accidentally got rid of them. :(
> 
> so these were the trials! I hope I got courage and skill down with the super excessive maul fight, and flesh was a pretty long trek in Tatooini sands thanks to Radia. spirit was Anakin being someone Val had to kill to get over her attachment, and insight was her distinguishing the infamous Anakin-bot from it's (familiar) gold lightsaber instead of his own. whew.
> 
> if you see any mistakes, or want to reflect on my writing, PLEASE DO! I feel like sometimes I get lose while writing and it becomes a narrative instead of describing all aspects of the story, among other things. if you notice any, feel free to comment criticism. I love that hot stuff. and thank you for any comments, or kudos, or hits, and thanks for making it this far already. this first chapter was about an 11800 word chonker. I hope to get another update up soon, because its summer now and i'll definitely have more time on my hands. i'm hoping to get more pre written in the future, so that i'll have content to publisj. thanks again for slapping this book, and I hope you stick around for more :)


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